


Reality Knocking on the Window

by samariumwriting



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Developing Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Magic, Misunderstandings, Past Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:27:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26215627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/samariumwriting/pseuds/samariumwriting
Summary: When Annette moves into her new apartment in a magic-heavy neighbourhood, she's determined to get to know everyone she can. This goes well, bar one individual - the reclusive man who lives next door.She started to think she'd never see him at all. That was, until she sees him one day out on the balcony while she's watering her plants.
Relationships: Annette Fantine Dominic & Sylvain Jose Gautier, Annette Fantine Dominic/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Comments: 17
Kudos: 53
Collections: Felannie Mini Bang 2020





	Reality Knocking on the Window

**Author's Note:**

> This is my piece for the Felannie mini bang! I worked with [@artsy_oleander](https://twitter.com/artsy_oleander?s=20) over on twitter and she made a [super cute piece of art](https://twitter.com/artsy_oleander/status/1300810653163229187?s=20) to go with the fic.

“Now, where’s my spatula?” Annette wondered to herself, pivoting on her left foot as she glanced around the apartment. Maybe under that box, or the other, or...Goddess, it felt like she couldn’t find anything right now.

She supposed, with moving, that it was sort of inevitable that she’d lose a couple of things. But the way it was at the moment, she felt like she was losing everything she took her eyes off of for more than two seconds. She could swear that the boxes she’d already checked had moved elsewhere, and now they looked like new boxes. Moving sucked.

Maybe it was the magic? She’d never lived in a neighbourhood like this, where there was a higher concentration of magic than just about anywhere else in the city. Maybe it did strange things like levitating boxes and switching their contents around. She looked around despairingly again, and sighed as the spatula didn’t appear. “Ugh, I give up.”

She could just make something else. She grabbed her frying pan, turned on the hob, and got to cooking. “Hi, I’m-” she stopped. “No, argh, that doesn’t work, that’s the wrong tone. Hi, I’m Annette, and I- Goddess, saying this stuff to myself is so embarrassing.”

Annette knew that, at some point at least, she was going to have to go around and introduce herself to all her new neighbours. There were five others in this building with her, and she hadn’t caught sight of any of them when bringing the handful of boxes she needed for tonight. The problem was getting her introduction right.

“Hi, I’m Annette,” she said, trying again. “I’m new here- no, no, that’s obvious, otherwise you wouldn’t be introducing yourself. I just moved in last Thursday...yeah, maybe that? And I’m really happy to meet you! I’m super excited to- no, too keen. I’m glad to have had the opportunity...no, that’s too much like a job interview.”

Her rice caught fire. Trying not to scream, Annette dumped the pan in the sink and sat down. Maybe she should just try to focus on one thing at once. “Hi, I’m Annette. I just moved in last Thursday, and I’m really happy to meet you! I’m glad I managed to get a flat in the area, I’m training as a teacher and I really want to focus on improving education for children with magical abilities.”

Satisfied, Annette let out a deep breath and returned to the cooking. Maybe now she’d be able to make something approaching edible.

* * *

The next day was full of exactly the encounters she’d predicted. When she went down to the bottom of the building to check her mail, she saw a young woman with pale hair checking the box above hers. “Hi, I’m Annette!” she said with a wave, and sprang into her introduction.

“I’m Lysithea,” the girl returned, and Annette was relieved to note that she was also smiling. Maybe that meant she hadn’t come off as too high-energy yet. “You’re going on to work in education?”

“Yeah!” she replied. “I’ll be working in mainstream schools and all, but I wanted to improve the way that students with magic are taught. Right now, there’s so much wrong with the educational approaches and- oh, you don’t need to listen to all this, I promise it’s not all that interesting.”

“But it is,” Lysithea said brightly. “I wasn’t taught in a mainstream school, but I have a lot of thoughts on how the education system could do a lot better. After all, it’s meant to reduce inequality and give everyone a fair chance, but it clearly doesn’t do that for everyone. I have plenty of opinions if you want to hear them, but I have a call with my supervisor in a moment so I sort of have to dash.”

“Of course!” Annette said, seeing her off with another smile. One down, four to go, and that first meeting was a decisive success.

The next person she met was Dorothea, who caught sight of her in the stairway when she was heading out to buy some groceries (she’d forgotten pasta when doing the bulk shop before she moved, so she may as well get it done sooner rather than later). “Hello there!” she said. “I’m Dorothea. Are you the girl who moved in the other day?”

“Yes, that’s me,” she replied, returning her wave. “I’m Annette.” As she ran through her introduction, Dorothea kept smiling.

“Oh, that’s such a vocation to dedicate yourself to,” she said. “Good on you. I wasn’t charitable minded enough to set my education on that course, so I dare say I’m not doing nearly so many exciting things as you. You’re clearly on your way out, so I’ll leave you be, but I think you’ll get on just great with everyone else in the building.”

“Thank you!” she said, feeling her face heat up a little. “Have a good day, Dorothea.”

After that, there was the woman she met when she accidentally dropped her keys down a gap in the stairs on her return from the shops. “Oh, gosh, I’m so sorry!” she called out, seeing the woman below her jump backwards. Fortunately, the keys didn’t hit her.

“Oh, it’s okay, don’t worry,” the woman said, handing the keys back. She didn’t meet Annette’s gaze, instead looking at the ground. “I’m Marianne. It’s good to meet you, and I’m really sorry for being in your way.”

“You’re not in the way at all!” Annette said, hoping that would reassure her a little. “Dropping my keys was an accident and I’m super sorry they got so close to you. I’m Annette, I’m new to the building.” This time, she opted not to go for her longer introduction; Marianne looked a little like she wanted to melt into the floor. Annette could relate to that, so she let her be.

The next meeting came when she was carrying a couple of the heavier items she needed to move into her apartment. As she made her way up the last couple of stairs, someone brushed past her. “Oh, hello,” he said, standing on the landing right in front of her. Annette stepped to the left and went to move around him.

“Hi,” Annette said, trying to smile through the strain of the heavy lifting. “I’m Annette, it’s good to meet you. I’m sorry, now isn’t the best time to do full introductions, I have a couple things to move.”

Annette was expecting the man to reply with an offer to help, but he just smiled. “That’s fine,” he said, topping off his dismissal with a yawn. “I’m Linhardt. We can talk another time.” And just like that, he was gone. Annette frowned. That was sort of rude, but maybe he was just lazy? Perhaps she’d get a better judge of him at another time.

When she’d finished up the last bits of heavy moving, there was a knock on her door. Her apartment was absolutely not presentable in any way, but she couldn’t exactly ignore whoever was there, so she went to answer the door. In front of her was a woman with short, pale hair and a bright smile. “Hello there!” she said. “My name is Mercedes. I saw you moving in the other day so I thought I’d bring some baking round.”

“Oh, thank you so much!” she said. “I’m Annette, please come in. It’s not very orderly yet, but there should at least be somewhere to sit.”

It only took a couple minutes for her to hit it off fantastically with Mercedes. As soon as she’d rattled her way through her introduction, Mercedes’ face softened, and they ended up talking about her own youth work; Mercedes worked with children who’d been affected by domestic abuse.

It wasn’t a pleasant topic, but the way Mercedes spoke about her work was just so...heartening. And Mercedes herself was so friendly, so fun to talk to. It made Annette really feel like she’d made the right choice in moving to the area. Her neighbours were lovely, welcoming, and made Annette excited for the future. 

Well, the ones she’d met were great, anyway.

The neighbour she didn’t meet, however, was the one next door. She shared a wall with them, and from the occasional sound that came from inside it seemed like they were around fairly often. She could see their balcony from hers, but other than that...well, she had no clue who they were. She hadn’t seen a sign of them.

“Hey Mercie,” Annette asked one afternoon, over a week after she’d moved into the building. Mercedes had taken to asking her in for tea almost every time she saw her, which was absolutely awful when it came to procrastination but delightful in every other way. “Do you think my next door neighbour is a vampire?” She honestly wasn’t sure if she was being serious or not. Maybe they _were_ a vampire.

Mercedes laughed. “I don’t know, honestly,” she said. “I’m fairly certain he’s not, because I tend to learn about those sorts of things pretty quickly - my brother is a vampire, you see. I haven’t met our mystery neighbour either, though, so I couldn’t say for sure.”

“Oh, he’s a man?” Annette asked. “Do you know his name?”

“No, at least not that I remember,” Mercedes admitted. “I’ve only seen him in passing, on the stairs and such. At least, I think he lives here; he could be someone’s friend who visits?”

“I don’t know,” Annette said, throwing her hands up. “I just thought it would be nice to know everyone, you know?”

“Of course,” Mercedes said, her voice taking the edge off Annette’s frustrations. “Maybe you could bake something and then take it round to his door. That kind of thing works normally, so if you knock maybe you’ll see him. Then you can introduce yourself and find out if he’s a vampire.”

“That’s a really good idea!” she said with a grin. “Thanks, Mercie. You’re the best.”

She did exactly what Mercedes suggested; she did some baking, tested both batches, picked the one that tasted better, and put them on a plate to take next door. After deliberating for just a moment, she rang the doorbell, trying not to let nervousness mount in her chest.

Inside the apartment, she could hear someone moving. Footsteps approached the door, paused, and then walked away again. Rude? Annette rang the doorbell again, but there was still no answer. Thoroughly frustrated, she took the baking away and ate it all herself. Her antisocial next door neighbour was missing out.

She tried not to think about the mysterious man next door at all for the next few days. Thinking about his implicit rejection stung a little, so it was better to just keep him completely out of her mind. But that all changed a week later, when she was out watering the plants on her balcony. As always, the balcony next to hers was empty, though the plants looked as healthy as always.

Finally feeling confident she wasn’t being listened to, Annette felt comfortable enough to sing about whatever was on her mind. “Don’t you all just want to grow, so big and tall? Climb little flowers, shoot up to the sun! Feel the water fresh in your roots.”

And it was all fine. The balcony next to hers was empty, until it wasn’t. When she’d barely even finished the first couple of lines, she heard the sound of a door opening. Except it wasn’t her balcony door, which meant...she turned to the left and came face to face with her mysterious neighbour.

The man stared at her. His eyes were light brown, and his dark hair was pinned clumsily out of his eyes. Annette felt a blush rising to her cheeks at the thought of being watched, and she closed her mouth abruptly. He frowned and, instead of saying something like a decent person would, he just lowered his gaze, watered his chilli plants, and went back inside.

Damn it.

Annette was pretty sure she’d lost her chance to make a good first impression by now, but she was intent on at least seeing him again. If she did, she could take a shot at salvaging their relationship. Even if she would always look like a fool who sang about nonsense to him.

Also, for the sake of her pride she needed to at _least_ know his name.

The next time she was out on the balcony, she didn’t sing, but she hummed along to a tune that she’d heard on the radio earlier that day. As if on cue, the man showed up again just as she got to her third plant. “Afternoon!” she greeted, ready this time for the heat that rose in her cheeks.

“Good afternoon,” he said. His voice was low, even, and slightly clipped. His expression didn’t change from what Annette would describe as carefully blank. “You live next door?”

“No, I break in regularly to water the plants,” she said cheerily, and after a moment his face lit up in understanding. “I’m Annette,” she continued. “I moved in a couple of weeks ago, but we haven’t had the chance to meet yet.” She opted not to go for the rest of her introduction; somehow, she didn’t think he’d appreciate it that much.

“I’m Felix,” he said. “I live here, I just haven’t seen you around yet.”

“Most people don’t, I think,” Annette said with a laugh. “My, uh, my friend who also lives in the building said she thought you might be a vampire.”

Felix huffed, and Annette was very glad she’d just sort of thrown Mercedes under the bus. She apologised in her head; she hadn’t wanted to wreck his perception of her even more. “I’m not a vampire,” he said. There was a moment of silence between them. “Do you put magic in your voice when you sing?”

“I- what?” she asked, and she felt like her face was on fire. “What kind of question is that?” He blinked. “Never mind, I- ugh.” She couldn’t tell if he was mocking her or not, so she opted for just escaping. Ah well, at least she got his name.

The next few times she went out on the balcony, she didn’t see Felix at all. The plants stayed watered, but there were plenty of hours in the day where he could be watering them. He wasn’t necessarily avoiding her, and maybe she wanted him to anyway. He was a bit strange.

A few days later, however, he had a couple of friends round. Which was fine. He was allowed to have friends, obviously. The only problem was that she had work in the morning, and they were being quite loud even as the hours wore on.

Giving up on getting any sleep until they were gone, Annette pulled a jacket over her sheep-patterned pyjamas and pushed her feet into the first shoes she could find before going round to knock on the door.

“Hi!” the man who answered the door greeted. He was...tall. Woah. He filled the doorway and grinned at her, red hair glowing in the light coming from behind him. “Are you here to join the party? Come on in.”

“No, really, I just live next door, and I wanted to-”

“Nah, come on!” he said. “Felix won’t mind if there’s one more person to trounce him at this. Actually, he might mind a little, but it’d be funny.”

“I said no! Uh, look, could I talk to Felix or something if you’re not going to listen?” Yes, she was being rude and she was going to hate herself for it later, but also she was tired and a little pissed off and this guy was being pushy.

“Woah, woah, okay,” he said, turning into the flat. “Felix! There’s a small angry lady at your door.”

A moment later, Felix appeared at the door. He looked between his loud friend and Annette and frowned. “Sorry, are we being too loud?” he asked. Annette nodded. “Ah, shit, I didn’t realise. Sylvain, this is Annette. She lives next door and she’s telling you that your mouth is too big. Be quieter.”

“Thanks,” Annette said, grimacing a little. It was a bit late to get a decent amount of sleep, but she could try. Felix looked at his friend - Sylvain, presumably - and then grimaced back at her before closing the door.

The next day, Felix came out onto the balcony again when Annette was watering her plants. “I’m sorry about last night,” he said, launching into his apology without even a greeting. “My friends can get pretty rowdy sometimes and I didn’t realise the walls were so thin.”

“It’s fine,” she assured him. Work had been slow, anyway, so she hadn’t needed the energy. “But hey, maybe you could make it up to me?” He paused, and after a moment nodded. He looked a little wary. “You could invite me round for tea. I’ll bring some baking and everything!”

Felix hesitated. “Fine,” he replied. “You can come over for tea if you like. Just don’t bring anything too sweet.”

The next day, Annette did just that. Armed with cookies she hoped were spicier than they were sweet, she knocked on Felix’s door. Unlike the first time, he answered. “Come in and sit down,” he said, gesturing stiffly inwards, and Annette stepped inside while trying not to look like she was staring at everything.

Because she was totally staring at everything. The whole apartment was so...strange. There were so many things that seemed normal to Annette that were nowhere to be seen - there was no TV near his sitting area, no blender or toaster or microwave on the countertops of the kitchen, and no…

Felix didn’t even have electric lights. What kind of cryptid _was_ he?

Fortunately, he was enough of a real living human person that, when they sat down for tea together (with the hot water poured from a kettle that wasn’t even electric), Felix liked her biscuits. “They’re good,” he complimented, his mouth half full. “What’s in them?”

“Cinnamon, mostly,” she said. “A little bit of nutmeg and ginger too. I thought, seeing as you said you didn’t like sweet things, spicy would be fine.”

“You were right,” he said, and there was a hint of a smile on his face. Annette was counting that as a victory. After a few minutes of sipping tea together in silence, however, Felix shifted awkwardly. “Why did you want to come to tea?” he asked.

“O-oh, I…” Annette flushed slightly. It was sort of silly, saying it aloud. “I wanted to meet all my neighbours and get on with them, and I felt like we got off to a bad start. I suppose I just want to know a bit more about you,” she admitted. “Is that okay?”

“Sure, go on,” he said, his face now carefully neutral. Annette was starting to think he didn’t have all that many feelings, actually. “You can ask me things.”

“How long have you lived here?” she asked. It was a very innocent place to start. His flat looked very...lived in, she supposed was the right word, but she hadn’t gone around snooping to confirm any suspicions.

“My whole life,” he answered. That wasn’t surprising, really, though Felix hadn’t initially given her the vibes of someone who spent all their time around magic.

“And your friends from before,” she started, and Felix raised an eyebrow, “do they live round here as well?” Sylvain had definitely given her magic user vibes, but she hadn’t seen the source of the other voices.

“A couple blocks away, but yes,” he answered. “They’ve lived here their whole lives too. You don’t tend to get much movement in places like this. Except for people like you, I suppose.”

Annette nodded. “I mean, I’m here for my job,” she explained. Felix looked at her questioningly. “I work in educating magical kids. This is the easiest place to get proper training on that.”

“Makes sense.”

“What about you?” she asked.

“I’m a doctoral student at the local university,” he replied. Annette’s eyebrows shot up; sure, Felix didn’t come off as stupid or anything, but the local university specialised in very niche magical stuff. You had to be pretty smart to get a place there. “I study magical culture.”

“Ohhh, that’s super interesting!” Annette said. “You’ll have to tell me about it some time.”

“When we have about six hours,” Felix said, a note of amusement entering his tone.

“Yeah,” Annette replied with a laugh. “I know some academics, I know better than to ask that kind of question in the evening. That’s basically your job, right?” Felix nodded. “What about your hobbies?”

That gave Felix pause for thought. Yep, the reason he was strange was probably just because he was buried in academia. “I paint sometimes?” he suggested, but he turned to the several bookshelves around him and gestured at them. “Mostly I just read.”

Annette laughed again, and Felix had the decency to look the tiniest bit embarrassed. “Do you even go outside?”

“Yes!” Felix objected, but he laughed along with her. After that, the conversation flowed a little easier. When Felix wasn’t being awkward and Annette couldn’t escape when she got flustered, it was nice. It wasn’t like talking to Mercedes, but Felix was entertaining and didn’t mind when she got off track.

They talked on until the sun set, and when it got dark, Felix snapped his fingers. Above them, a couple of balls of light that looked a little bit like lightbulbs appeared. Annette stared at them until her eyes went a little funny. “Why don’t you have electricity?” she asked.

“Why would I?” Felix asked, a small frown forming on his face.

Annette stared at him. “Why would you?” she repeated, a note of disbelief entering her voice. “Electricity saves so much effort. I didn’t even know it was legal to rent an apartment that didn’t have electricity, what if someone who didn’t have magic moved in?”

“Not having electricity saves on utility bills,” Felix replied with a shrug. “I imagine the whole block was built without electricity, and they’ve added it to a lot of the apartments since. I don’t need it.”

The conversation moved on after that, and Annette stayed a little longer before excusing herself to go to dinner. It had been a good afternoon, really, and Felix wasn’t quite the...well, he wasn’t the asshole she’d been expecting him to be.

“You’re right, he’s not a vampire,” Annette conceded the next time she saw Mercedes. In return, she received a knowing smile. “But he’s really strange. He doesn’t have electricity!”

Mercedes laughed lightly. “I’m not surprised you think he’s strange,” she said. “Honestly, I think anyone who’s lived here their whole life will end up a little bit odd by other people’s standards.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Annette said, but it stayed in the back of her mind anyway. What kind of person could live in the world right now without electricity? And then just be so nonplussed about the whole thing when it was brought up? She didn’t get it.

* * *

A few days later, Annette opened her laptop to a ConnectMe message from a stranger. Normally, she’d close those things immediately - she’d had enough creeps in her dms for a lifetime and she wasn’t exactly old.

But, just in case, she checked the profile of the person first. She’d made the mistake of blocking a colleague whose name had slipped her mind before, and it wasn’t going to happen again. As she did so, the cover image she was confronted with made her pause; three people she didn’t recognise, and one she did. Felix.

Felix was squinting up at the camera with an expression Annette could only describe as distrust. The background looked vaguely familiar, and it took Annette a moment to realise that it was the inside of Felix’s apartment.

She clicked back to the message from one ‘Sylvain Gautier’. Come to think of it, wasn’t that the name Felix had mentioned when complaining at the man who’d answered the door the other day? She hadn’t spent a long time looking at the redhead, but she supposed the man in the photo could be the same as the one who answered the door.

‘Heya,’ the message read, ‘just thought I’d shoot you a message as an apology for what happened the other night because I bet Felix didn’t say anything’

Underneath, there was another one. ‘O I’m Sylvain btw, I answered the door. Sorry for the casual stalk but I asked Felix’s landlord who lived next door so I could apologise for the noise and stuff’

Annette frowned at the messages, unsure for a moment as to how to respond. ‘Ty for the thought!!’ she replied, ‘but Felix did apologise. I went round for tea and everything’

‘holy shit’ came the near immediate response. ‘really???????’

‘yeah??????’ Perhaps not her finest or most eloquent response, but it probably wasn’t her worst moment either.

‘holy SHIT that’s wild’

‘please explain? ;-;’

‘Felix hasn’t made a friend since he was like. Three years old my pal’

‘Weird,’ Annette replied. ‘he seems pretty nice. Strange, but nice. U sure he’s not just hiding all his friendships from you? ;)’

‘pfft I’ve known Felix since before he could walk, but nice try,’ Sylvain replied. ‘it’s cool that you’re sort of friends tho. Take ur time with him, it’s tricky sometimes but being friends with Felix is real rewarding’

Annette was about to send a reply to his strangely worded message when Sylvain sent something else. ‘did you get to sleep alright after we quieted down a bit? sorry I didn’t ask lmao I was distracted by Felix’s spontaneous adoption of social skills’

‘yea it was fine!!’ she replied. ‘good to meet u when you’re not keeping me from sleeping tho xxx’

Sylvain didn’t reply with any more than a heart emoji after that, so Annette felt it was safe to move on to other things. Always in the back of her mind, however, were his words about talking to Felix.

It seemed...strange. Sure, Sylvain had clearly known Felix for a long time. But they were also clearly both adults, and the phrasing was just- odd. There was definitely some history Annette was missing - unsurprisingly, seeing as she’d known Felix for a fraction of the time Sylvain had - but it was still frustrating. Like Sylvain had been expecting her to want to drop Felix now she’d spent more than a couple of minutes talking to him.

It was weird, but in the end Annette supposed it didn’t matter. She could go on as she always did.

* * *

A couple of days later, Annette saw Felix on the balcony again after a long, long, _long_ day at work. “Do you mind if I just explain it to you properly?” Annette asked, after his second question as to why she looked so angry at her plants today.

“Go ahead,” Felix said with a shrug, stretching out to lean on the balcony railing that faced her own.

“It’s just so...badly organised!” she complained. “No one knows what they’re doing or where most people are meant to be all the time. And if that wasn’t bad enough, so many people just don’t care about connecting with the kids. Which doesn’t make any sense at all, by the way, because it’s not like this job pays well. _Also_ _,_ it’s really exhausting, so even the people who _do_ care are too tired to put a lot of time and effort in.”

“It sounds bad,” Felix said, contributing completely unhelpfully to her rant. “What’s the point, if it sucks so much?”

“I can’t just give up on it,” she said firmly. Felix tilted his head to the left curiously, encouraging her to continue. “My own education was- well, it was shit, honestly. No one gets magical students, because there’s such a fine balance with control in a classroom setting. I mean- research shows that magical students are just as likely to have specific learning difficulties as non magical ones, but they’re twice as likely to be put in low ability groups. It’s unfair! And I want to change that. But the system makes it so hard.”

Felix shrugged. “I didn’t know it could be like that,” he said. “I was homeschooled by my father. You don’t really get systemic discrimination in that kind of setting.”

“You were taught by your father?” she asked, more curious than anything. She sort of didn’t understand how Felix could have been taught one on one with undivided attention and still be so...stilted at times. It was as if he embarrassed her on purpose; he was so faltering it felt intentional sometimes. “What’s he like?”

“Dead,” Felix replied.

“Oh, shit, Sothis, I am _so_ sorry!” she exclaimed, hurriedly trying to cycle back through the conversation and work out how on earth she could solve this. Goddess, she hoped Felix wasn’t religious, either, because she’d totally just taken the Goddess’ name in vain and-

“It’s fine,” Felix said. His face was almost completely blank. “It’s been a couple of years.” But he didn’t say anything else, not even when she apologised again.

When Annette retreated back into her flat, she was absolutely convinced she’d ruined everything. Her budding friendship between Felix was definitely in tatters. How could he even bring himself to look at her after she’d asked such an insensitive question? She’d absolutely screwed up apologising too.

Letting out a groan, she flopped onto her sofa and pulled her phone out of her pocket. Just about dodging dropping it directly on her face, she opened her conversation with Sylvain from a few days ago. 

‘help I fucked up!!!’ Annette sent the message. Stared at it for a few moments. Contemplated deleting it. Opened a game, checked the message again. It was marked as read. Was he leaving her on read? She went to type a hurried apology before the app popped up to say he was, in fact, typing a reply.

‘I’m sure you didn’t. What happened?’ Annette sucked in a quick breath and tried to work out how to answer him without sounding weird or insensitive.

‘he mentioned his dad so I asked him about him ;-; and then he said ‘oh he’s dead’ and now I feel like an asshole!! I didn’t apologise properly!!! I screwed it all up’

‘nah you didn’t,’ Sylvain replied, thankfully replying quickly this time. ‘It’s chill. Felix didn’t even like his dad that much’

‘mood’ Annette sent, without even thinking, at the same time that Sylvain replied with:

‘mood, tbh.’ He followed it up with a couple of laugh cry emojis, but Annette saw him. She knew what that meant.

‘Seriously though,’ Sylvain sent a few moments later. ‘You shouldn’t worry about it. It’s chill and it won’t ruin your chances at all ;)’ Reading the message, Annette flushed bright red and pushed her face into the sofa cushion. Goddess, she was so embarrassed.

‘what?????? Dude I’m not even thinking about that!!!!’ Did he think she was trying to get his advice on dating Felix? She didn’t like Felix like that! She hadn’t even thought about it and she absolutely wasn’t even going to! Because she’d almost definitely ruined all her chances anyway and she was not discussing a theoretical crush with an almost complete stranger. Nope. Not at all.

‘Sure you’re not,’ Sylvain replied. He followed it up with a few winking emojis and if she hadn’t known he was stupidly tall, Annette would have told him that she’d throttle him the next time she saw him. As it was, she didn’t think she’d actually be able to reach his neck. ‘he is pretty cute tho right ;)’

‘yeah okay he is,’ she replied. She could concede that much, even if she absolutely did not have a crush on Felix at all. Even though he _was_ really pretty and had nice eyelashes and a soft voice. And she bet his hair was even softer. But it wasn’t a crush at all. Absolutely not.

* * *

The next time she saw Felix, Annette decided that she was going to completely ignore the mistake she’d made, because she definitely had a tendency to overthink things (according to the counsellor she’d seen at school six years ago anyway) and Sylvain had insisted that it wasn’t a big deal.

Instead, she decided to make the most of the sort of decent rapport she’d built up with Felix and invited him over. “I want to show you what a microwave is,” she explained.

“I absolutely know what a microwave is,” Felix said, and then he accepted her invitation, so the truth of his statement was definitely up in the air.

He came around the next evening for dinner and it was...nice. Felix looked like he’d combed his hair, and he complimented her cooking. She thought it was overloaded with spice, but at least she knew what kind of food he liked now.

Felix was quiet for most of the meal, but it didn’t feel awkward. Annette got the feeling that quiet was pretty much Felix’s default setting, which made sense seeing as he seemingly spent most of his time indoors and not around anyone else. 

After a while, though, Felix opened his mouth. “I didn’t answer your question about my father,” he said, and Annette bit back the apology on her tongue to let him continue, instead offering him a smile. “Would telling you how he taught me be...useful to the job you’re doing?”

“Absolutely!” she said, her smile widening. She’d prefer if he dropped it altogether, but it sounded like a peace offering more than anything. Felix returned her expression with a small smile of his own.

“I mean, most of it is standard stuff for a sickly child,” he said with a shrug, “and probably not all that helpful. I used mainstream school resources my father took from his friends’ children, but I also got to pursue my interests. When it came to teaching things when I was struggling with magical control, I needed frequent breaks, and the absolute enemy was frustration. Maybe my father shouldn’t have been quite so lenient on not teaching me much physics, but it was better than having the power in the block go out.”

“In the block?” Annette asked, her eyes slightly wide. She’d managed to blow a lightbulb a handful of times in her first few years of school. She’d definitely shorted a few things out and caused a couple of minor dust storms on the playground, too, but a block?

“It might be an exaggeration,” Felix said with a shrug, but something about it wasn’t too convincing. “My father used to tell the story as something funny to pass on. I don’t remember it happening myself.”

Annette nodded, and Felix continued speaking. “Homeschooling is very common in families where magic is clearly hereditary. There’s a desire to pass on specific traditions and values that kids might not take to as well if they go to normal schools, so it’s a key cornerstone of a community like this. I bet a lot of the kids you teach know at least one person who’s homeschooled.”

After a few sentences, Annette realised that Felix had very much gone off track from what was actually helpful to her and into a ramble about some magical culture stuff he found interesting, but she didn’t mind. It was interesting.

But it also had her thinking. Felix _was_ interesting. He had passions, and he liked talking about them. So why was he so...shy? Why hadn’t he answered the door the first time she knocked? Why did none of her neighbours know him?

As the evening wore on, Annette managed to work herself up to asking the question. “Felix, why are you shy about meeting other people?” she asked. Maybe it was rude, but Felix hadn’t actually seemed to take offence at anything she’d asked so far. She’d already made what she thought was a huge blunder and he didn’t seem to mind, so there was probably no harm in it.

Felix grumbled something under his breath, but he didn’t actually seem annoyed. “Most people don’t get it,” he said. He didn’t tell her what ‘it’ was, but from the way he’d been speaking Annette had a pretty good idea; a lot of his experiences in life diverted pretty heavily from what was normal. He probably just felt distant from other people.

Annette smiled at him, hoping she looked encouraging. “I was going to invite the other people who live in the building round to mine at some point,” she said. “You could meet them and give them a chance, at least - they might not be as alien to you as you’re anticipating.”

Felix looked at her, a slightly strange expression on his face. Surprise? She thought he was pretty transparent, honestly. “I’ll think about it,” he said. Annette could count that as a victory.

The problem was that when Annette _did_ organise something, Felix didn’t come. It was a great evening, and she loved being around the people she lived with - they were all absolute characters, and they didn’t always get along entirely, but it was still a lot of fun. Even with the fun, though...Felix’s absence hung over her head the whole time.

The next time Annette was out on the balcony, Felix showed up. Not even waiting for him to say hello, Annette launched into her question. “Why didn’t you come last night? I know you could hear us.”

Felix looked down at his plants, avoiding her gaze. “I wasn’t feeling it,” he admitted. “Maybe next time.” He didn’t sound particularly sorry, and he didn’t apologise for basically standing her up. Annette found herself getting irritated; his attitude sort of stank.

“I wish you wouldn’t be so chill about this,” she huffed, and Felix’s gaze moved from the ground to watch her. She still couldn’t interpret his face. “You could have at least told me you weren’t planning on coming. At least then I would have known.”

Felix turned around and went back into his flat without another word, and the weight of Annette’s words hit her. Goddess, that was so stupid! She’d almost definitely ruined her friendship with him that time. She’d assumed he was fine and just being rude, and then she hadn’t even accepted what was probably a perfectly reasonable excuse.

She stewed in her thoughts for the rest of the afternoon, watching the sunset through her balcony doors and trying not to frown too much. She hated being wrong, and she extra hated being wrong when she’d clearly hurt someone over what she’d said. Given how Felix could be, she didn’t even know if she’d get the chance to apologise. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Just as the sun dipped below the horizon and Annette had finished stuffing some comfort food in her mouth (which hadn’t actually made her feel better but it gave her the illusion of doing something that might help so it was fine), there was a knock on the door.

When she opened it, she saw Sylvain, as well as the two other people she’d seen in the cover photo on his ConnectMe profile. Clearly, they were Felix’s friends. “I’m really sorry for the imposition,” the blonde woman said. “Can we come in?”

“O-of course!” Annette said, casting a hurried glance back into her apartment. It wasn’t too messy, so it was probably okay. She had no idea why they were here, but she couldn’t actually see a reason to refuse them entry without looking rude.

“Thank you so much,” said the other one she didn’t know the name of; a much taller blond man. Vaguely, Annette thought she recognised their voices, so they were probably the other two people from the gathering Felix held a couple weeks ago.

The three of them sat down, looking decidedly comfortable on Annette’s probably-too-small-for-three-people sofa. It was Sylvain who spoke first. “Did you have an argument with Felix?” he asked.

“Sort of?” Annette replied. That meant Felix must have told one of them what had happened, and now they knew what a shitty friend she was. Goddess, she was in so much shit, his blond friend was _huge_. “It wasn’t big, but I think I sort of screwed things up.”

“You didn’t,” Sylvain said firmly, and there was a weight to his tone that Annette felt inclined to trust. “I...I don’t think you realise how good you are for Felix, Annette. Even if you argued, he just-”

“Something happened to Felix a long time ago,” Ingrid said. And, okay, that sure was a way to make a conversation far heavier than Annette wanted it to be. “It’s not our place to tell you the details, but just know you’re doing wonderfully, even if he gets prickly sometimes.”

“I- uh- I mean…” Honestly, Annette had no idea what to say. All of them had such intense gazes, and they were talking about something so important...there wasn’t really anything she could say to express the gratitude she felt at their words, but she could try. “Thanks. For saying that. It means a lot, because I’m really trying, I just- oh, Goddess, I’m so rude! I should have offered you food, since you came all this way.”

“No, but thank you,” the blond man said. He was wearing an eyepatch, and Annette felt even more silly now because she hadn’t even noticed it. What if she’d stepped into his blind side without noticing and worried him? Goddess, she was so scatterbrained. “We were actually here to visit Felix, but we thought we’d stop by.”

“You should come along!” Sylvain suggested with a grin. “I’m sure Felix will be glad to see you.” They must have had a conversation with Felix before they came over, because Annette hadn’t got the impression that Felix wanted to see her at all or ever again.

“If you really think I should,” she said, trying to keep most of the hesitance out of her voice. The three of them nodded in unison and, well, she couldn’t really say no to that.

When the blonde woman (Ingrid, she learned) knocked on Felix’s door, Annette was successfully hidden behind Felix’s absolutely giant friends. But when Felix caught a glimpse of her when Sylvain made his way inside, there was...a small smile on his face. He seemed surprised, but he definitely wasn’t angry. That was a start, at least.

Felix pulled a complicated-looking board game out of the cupboard that Annette had the fortune (or perhaps misfortune, considering what a trial she remembered it being) of having played before. At least she understood it vaguely as they began.

It started well, and within a couple of rounds Felix was glaring daggers at all three of his friends. “I can’t believe you made that move, Dimitri you bastard,” Felix practically growled, aggressively shaking his set of dice and rolling them across the board with a rattle. Two ones. “Fuck.”

“Chill, Felix,” Sylvain said, leaning back in his seat. “It’s just a game.”

“It’s not just a game,” Felix shot back. “This is ritual murder. You’re all out to get me.” This time, his glare was directed at Ingrid. She smiled sweetly at him and took a handful of chips from his pile as her character passed his. For the third time. Felix had the smallest pile.

“Oh, I agree,” Dimitri said. “This is a vitally important bonding ritual. Isn’t that right, Felix?” There was a knowing lilt to his voice that had Ingrid and Sylvain in fits of laughter. Annette looked at them all, a question in her eyes.

“Ohhhh, you don’t know this one!” Sylvain crowed, gleefully launching into the tale. “Basically, when Felix was about, uh, yea high,” he said, indicating the top of one of Felix’s shorter bookshelves, “he couldn’t really leave the flat, and he was super salty about it. Like, really moody. You haven’t seen Fe here in a proper moody funk but trust me, it’s hell.”

“Get on with it, Sylvain,” Felix groaned, taking his turn. He groaned again and passed three of his cards over to Dimitri, who took them with no small amount of glee.

“Basically, Felix here was living with his dad and his big bro, but he got sick of them a lot and they sure as hell were sick of him sometimes.” Annette thought that was a little cruel, but also she hadn’t spent a particularly lengthy period of time with a presumably housebound child Felix. Maybe he _was_ that bad. “And he basically begged them both to let him have friends round as much as possible.”

“We had school,” Ingrid explained, “so we couldn’t stay up to ridiculous hours of the morning playing games like these which were definitely too complicated for us to understand.”

“But Felix insisted. He wasn’t a particularly wordy kid, but his line was always that it was a ‘bonding ritual’. Which, I’m sure you know, is a pretty old traditional-”

“You shouldn’t assume that people know these kinds of things, Sylvain,” Dimitri chastised, leaning over to take four chips from Felix’s pile. Felix’s head was in his hands. “It’s not fair.”

“Okay, basically a bonding ritual is an old traditional magic marriage ceremony,” Sylvain said, and Annette snorted. “Felix kept telling his father and brother that we were getting married over this fresh hell.” He gestured at the board in front of them, which was starting to get jumbled with all kinds of placeable hazard cards.

“Okay, okay, you’ve had your fun,” Felix said. He put a card down on the board, and all three of his friends gasped in unison. “This is an endgame card,” he explained to Annette, who was pretty sure that this wasn’t in the rules of the game but she wasn’t going to object.

He grinned gleefully at all of his friends, which was sort of...well, it was heartening to see. Felix was really in his element with this kind of thing, and he spoke so naturally with his friends. Annette was starting to see what Sylvain meant when he said that taking the time to get to know Felix was worth it.

Annette didn’t quite understand this endgame card rule or whatever, but she ended up winning the game. Somehow. It involved something to do with rolling some dice and then taking all of the chips and cards that Felix had just won back against the rest of his friends, also through the endgame rules she didn’t understand.

“You’re a filthy backstabber,” he complained. “But I...don’t mind that you won. If that means anything.” He smiled, very slightly, and Ingrid leaned in and whacked him over the head. He started laughing. Seeing Felix smile, hearing him laugh...it was sort of breathtaking. Annette wanted to see that more. She wanted to be able to make him do that in the way his friends could.

“Thanks for coming,” Felix said, when he finally pushed them out of the door at a time that was way, way too late but Annette couldn’t bring herself to care too much. “It was good.” He was almost glowing in the light coming from his apartment as he closed the door. Annette repressed a happy sigh until she was safely back in her apartment.

As she got into bed, thoroughly exhausted with her cheeks aching from smiling so much, Annette realised that maybe she was sort of falling for Felix a bit.

* * *

Now that she’d realised that she sort of kind of had a crush, Annette was absolutely mortified when she saw Felix out on the balcony again. She felt a blush rise to her cheeks that definitely hadn’t been there before, and honestly damn her brain for latching onto this so quickly. She just wanted to have a normal conversation with him!

Even as she got flustered and fumbled over her watering can, Felix smiled at her. Brightly. Her heart beat even faster and she was pretty sure she got slightly dizzy. Goddess, she was a mess.

“Did you want to come over again some time?” he asked. “Last night was fun. I’d like to do it again, but maybe without all those oafs there. They can be pretty loud.”

Annette nodded, not quite believing her ears. All the times she’d done something with Felix, it had been her who initiated it, her who showed up at his door with his friends. For a shut in like him, maybe an invite to come round was...a date? No, she couldn’t think of it like that. She’d get too nervous.

She was nervous anyway, but she went round the next evening and managed to keep her feelings mostly under control. They cooked together on Felix’s (magic-lit) stove, and it wasn’t...well, Felix wasn’t a fantastic cook, but he wasn’t awful and neither was Annette, so it was definitely edible. She was maybe building up a better tolerance for spice.

As they ate, Felix encouraged her to talk again. “I like hearing you speak about yourself,” he said. His cheeks were a little pink, and she told herself it was from the cooking. “There was a lot less of that last night, and I sort of wanted to make it up to you. I- didn’t want you to feel like my friends were talking over you.”

“They weren’t!” Annette promised. “I wouldn’t have wanted to vent about my dumb job training when they were all there anyway. It’s not very interesting.”

“Don’t say that about the thing you care about,” Felix said firmly, and Annette relented. He sort of had a point.

“I just...it feels sort of pointless even trying,” she admitted. “I know it’s not really, and even if I make a difference to one kid’s life then I’ll be really happy, but it’s just- I started at school nearly twenty years ago now, and people still haven’t learned from countless examples like me. I’m lucky, and I still shudder to think of the way I was treated.”

“It sounds really bad,” he said. His voice actually sounded sort of sympathetic. “I barely remember when I was in normal schooling, but my friends have horror stories even in a neighbourhood with so many magical families. I’m sort of glad I got out of it, even if it was in...bad circumstances.”

For a moment, Annette wanted to ask him about the bad circumstances that kept him out of school. She’d heard a little of how Felix hadn’t been a particularly healthy child, but...well, he hadn’t put details to it and she didn’t want to pry. “And it always really sucks,” she continued, “because I know that if I mess up, those kids will go home and complain, and their families probably just won’t believe them.”

“I’m sure you won’t mess up,” Felix said, his voice gentle. Annette smiled back at him.

“I’ll try,” she said, “but I’m human and I can’t always get everything right, you know? But I can just see them going home upset and being told they’re making it up, because to the parents I seem totally nice and all that. That’s what my father did.” The last sentence came out almost spontaneously and way more bitterly than she’d intended. She didn’t like complaining about her father too much, as flawed as he was.

Felix didn’t pry, but he did his best to respond sympathetically. “I understand the feeling, if not the experience,” he said. “My father could understand some things about the way I felt as a child, but we still clashed...a lot. He didn’t always listen to me when I needed to be heard.”

Annette laughed slightly. “Dads sort of suck sometimes, huh?”

Felix smiled back at her, and her heart leapt. “Yeah, I guess they do.”

There was still that light pink blush dusting the top of Felix’s cheekbones, and Annette’s brain made the decision for her; he was way too handsome to ignore. She leaned across the low table the food had been set out on and went in for a kiss.

Felix pulled away. Annette felt something splinter inside her. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice now very, very quiet. “We shouldn’t.”

“O-okay,” she said, wishing her voice didn’t shake quite so much. “Sorry.”

“I can’t- I can’t really explain, but please listen to me on this. I don’t want to upset you.”

He already had. They floundered for a few minutes, attempting to restart some conversation, but it didn’t work. They cut the evening short quickly afterwards, and Annette went back to her flat, completely crushed. It felt like something had died inside her, and the moment she was sure Felix wouldn’t be able to hear, she burst into tears.

She’d definitely, absolutely, completely ruined everything. She didn’t realise just how badly she’d read the room until she thought back on it now - nothing had really suggested that Felix was attracted to her. She was only really thinking of herself, and she hadn’t even asked him if he wanted to kiss her!

He’d probably had a hundred very good reasons about how there were very few things that were actually attractive about her, or that he didn’t like her in that way, or he was in love with someone else. Goddess, maybe he was gay and she’d just forced herself on him. How could she have been so stupid?

When her tears had dried up a little (and renewed once or twice, and dried up again), Annette pulled her phone from between the sofa cushions, where it had fallen when she discarded it in an attempt not to throw it across the room. ‘Sylvain, help,’ she typed. ‘I tried to kiss him and he told me not to :(‘

‘ah shit,’ Sylvain replied, his response coming almost immediately. ‘I’m sorry, Annette. Don’t know if you’ll believe me, but I think you should stick with it’

‘I am NOT forcing myself on him,’ she replied furiously.

‘No no of course,’ Sylvain responded. ‘That’s not what I meant, don’t worry. I mean you maybe scared him off a bit but he probably doesn’t hate you for it. So stay friends with him. Trust me, I think Dimitri and I have both kissed Felix at least once and we’re all still friends’

The thought of this actually didn’t comfort Annette very much, but there wasn’t really all that much she could do about it and she didn’t want to be mean. ‘I’ll try and stay friends,’ she decided. ‘But if he doesn’t want that then neither do I. I’m sorry I screwed this up :(‘

‘u absolutely do not have to apologise to me,’ Sylvain replied. ‘I’m giving you this advice for you. And for Felix. I want you both to be happy, okay? And whether that’s in friendship or in something else I super don’t mind.’

That, at least, made Annette feel a little better. It took a bit longer of her wallowing and feeling sorry for herself for being too forward with Felix, but she eventually managed to get to sleep. When she woke in the morning, Sylvain had sent another message: ‘He’ll warm up with time, Annette. You’re doing fantastic.’

* * *

Annette saw Felix on the balcony a few days later. She greeted him, he responded. It was fine. She saw him again, and the same thing happened. A third time, she didn’t say anything, waiting for him to speak; this time, silence.

She gave up for a bit. Clearly he was just continuing this out of...politeness, or something. Yeah, probably that. Felix didn’t strike her as particularly polite, but clearly he was trying. It was better than nothing, but it also wasn’t very much of something, and it was upsetting. They’d got on so well before.

After a while, though, she realised that Felix probably just wanted her to start the conversation. So she did, and the change was- immediate, really. The moment she started even the most mundane of conversations, he launched straight back into the friendly if a little withdrawn demeanour she was so used to.

He asked her about her work again, and her training. He slipped in little conversations about whether she’d seen Mercedes recently, or if her father had done anything particularly infuriating lately. It was nice, and honestly she was just happy to have conversations with him for a while. But the days wore on, and her patience wore thin.

“Do you want to come round this evening?” Annette asked one afternoon. She was sick of dancing around him, watching him water his plants and engaging in light conversation. They were getting nowhere. “I have some tea I think you’ll like.”

Felix hesitated, if only for a moment. In that moment, Annette felt sure he would refuse; the last time they were actually in the same room together, she’d tried to kiss him. He had every reason to refuse, and yet… “Sure,” Felix replied. “I’ll come over later.”

When he arrived, silence hung between them. Annette struggled a handful of times to start a conversation, but Felix let it drift into silence time and time again. He was tense. She was tense. They both knew what the other was thinking about, and if Felix wasn’t going to put it into words then Annette would have to do it herself.

“What’s the problem with me?” she asked.

“There’s no- not with you,” he answered, changing his phrasing slightly when she fixed him with a look. “It’s me.”

“What’s that meant to mean?” she asked. “I don’t _want_ to be rude, Felix, but I really do want an explanation, if you can just give one?”

Felix looked at her, a slightly pained look on his face. He took a deep breath. “This is a strange story,” he said, “but bear with me. It’ll make sense when I reach the end.”

* * *

“Watch where you’re going!” the child called, their face twisted into an ugly expression of anger. “You should be more careful. You’re such a clumsy little infant, why do people even let you walk? I bet that big brother of yours thinks you’re really useless.”

Felix couldn’t help himself at that point; he’d been sniffling already from the force of the impact, and now he burst into tears properly. Glenn, catching the tail end of the chastisement, stormed over.

“How dare you talk to my little brother like that?” he asked. He stood over the child, fists up. “None of those things are true at all. You were just in the way of where he was running, and you’re bigger than him so you should be the one to move. Apologise to him.”

“How dare you?” the child replied. That was when their eyes flashed a dark colour, and Felix could have sworn they got a little taller. “You have no idea who you’re speaking to, do you? Stupid child. Stupid children. Your parents should have taught you far better manners than this.”

Felix, realising that the child he’d bumped into probably wasn’t an actual child, tugged on Glenn’s sleeve. But Glenn didn’t budge, somehow transfixed by the thing in front of them, which continued to speak. “Why don’t I teach you both a lesson? I think you could do with one.” And then they continued speaking, but their voice sounded more like water running over dry ground than actual words.

Once the words dried up, the child, creature, whatever it was, disappeared. Felix continued to cry, and his brother held him until his tears calmed. Everything was fine, they were just a little shaken.

And things stayed fine, for a while. Glenn was a little restless, but his father put it down to being antsy about being unable to protect his brother from all the unknowns of the world. Felix’s magic acted up a little, but that was normal too; he was young, just coming into another part of his power.

There was nothing that suggested anything was wrong until that winter holiday ended and Felix went back to school. Part way through a lesson that Felix didn’t really remember, he found himself suddenly short of breath. Dizzy. His father fetched him, took him home, and things went back to normal. But then it happened again the next day, and then the next.

“I believe your son has been cursed,” the doctor explained, when his father finally secured an appointment. Felix had barely been able to stay upright during the examination, out of breath from all the time spent in the waiting room, until the doctor tried something else.

He got a nurse who knew some magic into the office, and asked her to...direct a spell into his body. Within moments, he was feeling better, his breathing easier. “It’s something to do with his attachment to magic,” he continued.

“Is there any way to change it?” his father asked, his voice filled with concern. In the past few days, Glenn’s inability to sit still had become far worse - their father couldn’t supervise his practically housebound son at the same time as getting his other son to let off some steam. “Reverse the curse somehow?”

The doctor shook his head. “I’m no expert in magical ailments, I’m afraid, but I know that curses are permanent unless you can find the person who laid it.”

“Glenn said the individual disappeared…” Rodrigue replied. It was the beginning of a long series of restrictions on Felix’s life. And that list of limits just got longer.

At first, they thought it would be fine; if Felix was too reliant on ambient magic, they could take him to places with plenty of it. They lived in one such space, and while they couldn’t find a school with enough, he could attend plenty of local events.

That was, until they realised the other part of a heightened bond with magic. Rodrigue dropped Felix off at an after school magic club, expecting everything to be perfectly fine - he had to take Glenn to an appointment to work out what manner of curse had been placed on him.

There were people all around him, and every single one of them was trying to control and channel magic. Each one of them was just a little bit too close, and the magic swirled and circled around everything. It seeped into every tiny gap in the room, making Felix dizzy, lightheaded in a way that had nothing to do with the feeling of not enough.

It was too much. Felix passed out, relegating him to a strange kind of half life. He couldn’t go to many places; there were few spots outside of their neighbourhood with enough magic to sustain him at a base level. But if he spent too much time around people with lots of magic, he couldn’t keep his focus. There was no way out.

* * *

“I don’t have a future,” Felix said at the end of his explanation. “I can’t do much beyond the way I live now. I’ll be the slightly strange shut-in for the rest of my life, and I...I care about you, Annette. I can’t ask you to commit to someone like me.”

Annette tried not to ball her hands into fists as she prepared to answer all his...bullshit. “Felix,” she said firmly, “that’s a bunch of nonsense.”

Felix looked surprised, his eyes wide open and his mouth forming a small o. “It...is?”

“Of course,” she replied. Maybe he was cursed. Maybe he couldn’t go out much or even stay in with too many people. But that didn’t matter an inch to _her_. It mattered to him. “Whether or not I can commit to ‘someone like you’,” she continued, waving her hands in the air as she quoted him, “is my choice to make. And I’m making it.”

Felix nodded, and his face split into a small smile. “You’re right,” he said. “I...apologise. For pushing you away without asking. Can I make it up to you?”

“You could kiss me,” she suggested, and his smile widened as he leaned across the table to do just that.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! If you enjoyed, I'd really appreciate a comment. I also have a twitter [@samariumwriting](https://twitter.com/samariumwriting?s=20) where I talk about my writing a whole bunch :)
> 
> Also I have a loosely planned sequel for this fic which I could potentially write in the future, if you'd be interested in seeing that please lmk!


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